No DL for Crisp; Anderson, McCarthy, Braden updates

Coco Crisp isn’t in the lineup, but he could be back tomorrow or for the Yankees series after his left shoulder checked out yesterday; no structural damage, according to manager Bob Melvin. Crisp is doing some baseball activities today and he’ll be reassessed tomorrow.

Brett Anderson, just a year removed from Tommy John surgery, tells me that he’s going to Class-A Stockton on Saturday to start a rehab assignment; he’s likely to throw 45 pitches his first outing there, the same amount he threw in a three-inning simulated game yesterday. Anderson is likely to make three or four rehab starts, which means he would be back in Oakland’s rotation the second week of August.

Brandon McCarthy says that he’s throwing a bullpen session tomorrow, another after that and then he hopes that he can pitch for Oakland after maybe one session of throwing to hitters rather than going on a rehab assignment. Of course, should the A’s want him to go make a minor-league start, he’d be fine with it, but I think given the sort of predictable pattern of shoulder problems he’s had, he probably prefers to save his bullets for big-league games.

If all continues to go well, that means he could be pitching for the A’s again before the end of the month. His shoulder problems can crop up any time though, so there’s no real way to say. He just goes by how the shoulder responds each start, each bullpen session.

It’s a tricky spot for a pending free agent to be in. McCarthy would like to make every start, but he doesn’t want to hurt the team if he can’t get on the mound on a regular basis, and at the same time, he needs to make starts and show he’s healthy with an eye toward employment next year. The shoulder problem has been tough to diagnose, and everything is so nebulous, it’s difficult for McCarthy to know what to do. So he keeps plugging away in this weird cycle: great start, great start, shut down with shoulder discomfort, bullpen session, bullpen session, great start.

If he wasn’t putting up such great numbers when healthy, this might be as disruptive as McCarthy feels. As it is, the A’s will take all the innings they can get out of McCarthy, and whenever he needs time off, they apparently seem to have some sort of secret factory churning out quality starting pitchers at Sacramento or Midland. McCarthy and Anderson were both raving about the job that so-called fill-ins such as A.J. Griffin and Travis Blackley have done. Anderson keeps joking that he won’t have a rotation spot to return to.

So with that in mind, might the A’s go to a six-man rotation when McCarthy returns? I think they might, and I certainly think it makes sense. The A’s want to limit Jarrod Parker’s innings, and I asked McCarthy if a six-man rotation would help him and he said it definitely wouldn’t hurt. So there you go. Why not give it a whirl?

The question then is: do you drop down one reliever knowing you have extra arms to fill in if needed in the bullpen, or do you drop a position player? I don’t see where they could lose any of their current position players – they’re all playing and all filling necessary roles.

Speaking of which, outfielder Collin Cowgill came off the DL today after missing three weeks with an ankle injury, and there is no spot for him on Oakland’s roster, so he was sent to Triple-A Sacramento.

Dallas Braden threw a 40-pitch bullpen session today and he’ll throw another later in the week. He used all his pitches, and, Melvin said, he “bounced off the mound.”

Yoenis Cespedes could be back in the outfield tomorrow, but I’m not sure why the A’s would rush him back out there – Seth Smith hits better when he’s playing in the outfield, and Cespedes has hit well as a DH. I know his longtime spot is obviously as a starting outfielder, but hey, ride this little wave for a while if it’s working.